Why is Apple obsessed with the iPhone’s Calculator icon?

No app icon in the history of iPhone-dom has undergone as much design scrutiny as the poor Calculator icon. For reasons known only to Apple, the Calculator icon has been changed with each and every version of the iPhone OS, and apparently OS 4 is no different.

Perhaps sensing how important the calculator icon is in the smart phone game, it appears Apple is determined to get it just right. In fact, I’ve heard rumors that the reason the iPhone does not support Flash is because Apple reassigned key members of the Flash team to the “Calculator icon” division, which, at 11 employees, is the largest iPhone department in Cupertino, answerable only to Steve Jobs himself.

I’m not saying the evolution of the icon hasn’t been fun to watch, and I’ll admit it looks better in version 4 than version 1, but I think with the exception of the Contacts app, the calculator might by the least used app on my iPhone, and I certainly was never confused as to what it did from looking at ANY of the icons.

If anything, the iPod icon is now somewhat confusing. Who the hell has seen a click wheel iPod in the last 3 years?

Who’s seen a click wheel iPod recently? Anyone who, like me, uses their iPod primarily for playing music (you know, that thing iPods were invented to do) and have large collections. A 120GB iPod classic fits into my pocket a lot better than a storage-equivalent number of iTouches.

Actually… I’m not sure when this happened, but the iPod icon now has lines going from the top-right to the bottom-left. If you can’t see it on your iPod/iPhone’s screen, take a look at Apple’s page. http://www.apple.com/iphone/iphone-3gs/ipod.html

The calculator icon first changed at the launch of the iPod touch (1.1) not OS 2. The icon changed in OS 2 to show the square buttons. The icon never changed in OS 3. In OS 4 the icon changes for the fourth time.

A nice new (I think) feature in iTunes, if you goto to the Apps section of your Library (not the apps tab in your iPhone), you can switch to a coverflow/list view of your apps with, sometimes, wonderful hi-res iPhone app icons… I was amazed at the quality of most of them when they’re blown up to fill half the screen… More at the fact that developers submit icons of such quality!

Au contreir, mon a mi, I still have an iPod classic! Granted, that’s only because the iPodTouches/iPhones don’t have enough storage capacity yet at an affordable price, but the product line is still selling, and what is more ubiquitous with the term iPod than a click wheel? This from a guy who’s had an iPod since late 2001…

The design process here reveals so much about people think and create, its amazing. Ever pick up one of those Culligan gallon water jugs? Kind of hard to carry, but a few years ago they finally thought to add a handle to the darn thing. And Hanes finally removed that itchy tag from t-shirts so now the label is right in the fabric. And designers stopped using the html form ‘reset’ button, which is like a giant ACME “Do not push” button right next to the button that you actually need to use. Takes a brain, right?

Apple is excellent at eliminating “chart junk” from their interfaces. But more than that, they know that interface is what sells technology, and its not done in a single step and you have to be paying attention.